


Professionalism

by seaunicorn



Category: Carmilla (Web Series)
Genre: Cat Carmilla, F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-01
Updated: 2015-07-01
Packaged: 2018-04-07 05:08:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,942
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4250520
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/seaunicorn/pseuds/seaunicorn
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Danny is a firefighter who keeps having to get Laura’s cat Carmilla out of the tree. Little does she know, Laura keeps putting her cat in the tree so Danny will come get her down.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Professionalism

The sound of the alarm blaring throughout the station jolts everyone awake.  Danny jerks her head up and looks around.  She fell asleep at her desk, again.  Danny stands up, stretches, and rubs her eyes.  There’s no announcement so it’s not an emergency. With any luck, maybe she won’t have to go out and can go back to sleep, this time on a bed.

“Hey, Lawrence!” Kirsch comes jogging down the hall.  “I got the call, thought you might be interested.”

“Kirsh,” Danny sighs. “Why in god’s name do you think I would be interested in going out on a call in the middle of the night?”

“There’s a cat stuck in a tree.”

Danny froze.  If it was whose cat she thought it was… But what are the odds of the same woman’s cat getting stuck up in the same tree three times in one week?  She sighs.

“Fine, I got it.”  Kirsch smirks and waggles his eyebrows suggestively. “No, stop that.”

“Come on, Lawrence!” he pesters, following her through the station.  “You’re gonna deny yourself the possibility of more sleep on the slight chance it’s the same girl?  You got it baaaad.”

“Stop talking,” Danny says.

“Are you going up in that tree to get her cat or do some k-i-s-s-i-n-g?”

“You are twelve years old.” Danny gets into the fire engine for non-emergencies and slams the door in Kirsch’s face before he can say anymore. Instead, he just makes kissy faces through the window until she drives off.

Why are all her coworkers so immature?

Alternately, why are they so invested in her romantic life?  Yeah, Danny was single and looking, but that didn’t mean she was lonely, and it  _didn’t_  mean that she was fawning over every cute girl she meets on the job.

Just one cute girl. And her cat that had a knack for getting into trouble.

Danny pulls up outside the now familiar apartment complex with a massive tree out front, where a tiny woman stands staring up into the branches.  Danny wipes the giddy smile off her face before she opens the door and climbs out of the car.

“Miss Hollis?” she calls.

The tiny girl spins around and as soon as she sees Danny, her face lights up.  “Oh thank god you’re here!”

“Carmilla’s stuck again, huh?”

Laura nods.  “You know, I’m starting to think she doesn’t want to come down.”

“It is the third time this week, Miss Hollis.”

Laura groans.  “How many times do I have to tell you to call me Laura?”

“After your cat gets stuck at least twice more,” Danny jokes.  Laura giggles.  “I’m working, I’m just trying to be professional.”

“Well you’re the only one here,” Laura points out.  “Do you have to be professional?”

Danny smiles and shakes her head.  “I suppose not,” she mutters.  And when Laura raises an eyebrow at her, she hastily adds, “Laura.”

“Thank you.”

“Did you want to keep flirting or can I save your cat now?” Danny asks boldly, and when she sees Laura’s face tinge bright pink, she gets a self-satisfied smirk.

“N-no, um, I was just—go ahead,” Laura mumbles, flustered.  She stares at her shoes and scuffs them on the ground.  Danny studies her for a moment, thinking,  _wow this girl is adorable_ , and also,  _I’m so screwed_.

Danny grabs the ladder from the back of her truck and sets it up by the tree trunk.  As she climbs up the rungs she calls down to Laura, “How does she even get up here anyway?”

Laura shrugs bashfully. “Oh, I don’t know,” she says.  “Some of the branches hang low by my balcony, she probably climbs from there.”

As Danny approaches the lower branches, she turns on her flashlight and scans the area.  “Carmilla?” she whistles.  “Carm?  Where are you?”

The light reflects off a pair of beady eyes that would have otherwise blended into the dark surroundings.

“There you are.”

Danny climbs onto the nearest branch, and makes her way a few feet to where Carmilla sits, her tail tauntingly swinging back and forth.  Slowly and tentatively, Danny reaches out to grab her.  “Come here, girl….”  As her arms are about to wrap around the black, fluffy monster, Carmilla darts out of her grasp and back toward the ladder.

“Christ!”

She watches Carmilla approach the ladder.  “Oh, no.” Carmilla reaches out a paw toward the top rung.  “Don’t you dare.”  A little bit of force, and the devil cat pushes the ladder out of the tree.  It falls onto the ground with a resounding  _thud_.

Laura shrieks and darts out of the way, narrowly missing being crushed by it.

“Danny?” she calls up into the tree.  “Are you okay?”

“I’m golden,” Danny shouts back down.  “Your cat is just evil.”

“She is not evil!” Laura protests.  “She’s just misunderstood.  A lot of shelter cats are!”

“Yeah, yeah… Could you just get the ladder?” Danny asks.  “Please?”

Danny climbs across the branches toward Carmilla, who just sits on a branch, staring at her, taunting her.

“Oh, don’t look at me like that,” Danny mutters.

“What was that?” Laura asks,

“Nothing!”  Danny looks down and sees Laura struggling with the ladder.  “You getting that ladder?”

“In a sec, it’s really heavy!”

Danny giggles.  Laura was really cute, straining under the weight of the ladder, trying to prop it up against the tree again.

Danny reaches for another branch, but in her distraction, she slips.  She quickly wrasps her arms around the branch and heaves her upper body over, but her legs are dangling a good fifteen feet off the ground.  She yelps.

Laura hears the cry and looks up.  “DANNY! Oh god!”  She rushes to lift the ladder and prop it up against the tree again.

Danny swings her legs a little to build some momentum, and then uses the force to bring herself onto the branch.  She sighs and glances up at the cat, a few feet away.  Carmilla is licking her paw, paying no attention to Danny.

“You’re lucky your owner is so cute,” Danny grumbles, and climbs the next few feet so she’s close to the cat.

Carmilla looks up and stares straight into Danny’s eyes.  Danny glares back.  She edges her hands closer to the cat.  Danny swears she can hear western music playing, but maybe that’s just in her head.

The ladder slams against the trunk, and Carmilla freezes in shock.  Danny seizes her chance and snags the furry beast before she can slip away again.

Carmilla yelps and meows and claws at Danny in protest, but it doesn’t matter.  Danny has the cursed cat in tow and climbs down the ladder.

“Oh my god!”  Laura squeals in excitement and runs over to the base of the ladder.  “Thank you, thank you!”  As soon as Danny’s feet are on the ground, Laura envelops her in a tight hug.

Danny blushes, surprised by the embrace.  “I—uhh, it was nothing,” she stammers.  She hugs back, nonetheless.  She is even more surprised when Laura goes up on her tip toes and kisses her on the cheek. Danny is pretty sure the nerves in her cheek are going to explode at the contact, and her face burns as red as her hair.

“Oh, god!” Laura yelps. She jumps back, surprised with herself. “I’m sorry, was that inappropriate? I didn’t mean to be inappropriate. I just wanted to thank you because you’ve had to come out here so many times and you’re always so nice, and—“

“Laura!” Danny cuts her off. “It’s fine.  I’m gonna be honest with you…. I kind of choose to take the calls whenever a cat gets stuck in a tree because I’m hoping it’ll be you.  In fact, it is you almost all the time.”

“Really?” Laura asks, blushing and nervous.  “I, um, I have a confession to make too.”  Danny nods, urging her to continue.  “I may have kinda sorta been putting Carmilla in the tree in the hopes that you’ll come get her.”

Danny…doesn’t know what to say to that.  Her mouth falls open in shock.  “You… you what?”

“I’m sorry!” Laura plays with her own hands nervously and starts pacing back and forth.  “The first time was an accident, I have no idea how she got out there.  But then when I called and you came you were just… really… cute and I was too shy to do anything about it so I just put her in the tree again and hoped that you would show up and I guess I just kept doing that so I could see you, and I know it’s really bad because like what if there’s a real emergency? And honestly I didn’t think of that possibility until just now, oh crapola—“

Danny doesn’t know how to shut her up, so she does the first thing she can think of.  She sets down the damn cat that hasn’t stopped scratching her since she grabbed it, pulls Laura close and kisses her.

Laura freezes mid-sentence, her eyes wide open, but when she realizes what’s happening her eyes flutter shut.  She reaches up and wraps her arms around Danny’s neck, dragging her down, closer, and kisses her back.

Danny feels like she’s in heaven.  She’s imagined this exact scenario over and over in her head for weeks ever since she first saved Laura’s cat.  The only thing that can possibly pull her out of this perfect moment is a sharp pain in her leg.

She pulls away from the kiss quickly.  “Ouch!” She looks down and sees Carmilla digging her claws into her leg.  “Hey, get off!  I saved your life!”

Laura laughs, and gently picks up Carmilla into her arms.  “Stop that,” she coos.  Carmilla scratches Laura’s arm in protest.  Laura sighs.  “I’m sorry I put you in the tree.  I promise it won’t happen again.”

She looks up at Danny, who gazes down at her, a small smile on her lips, and a light behind her eyes. “What happened to wanting to be professional?” Laura asks, teasing her.

Danny thinks about it a moment, then simply shakes her head and says, “Screw professionalism.”  She leans down and kisses Laura again.  She’s wanted to kiss her for so long and finally, feeling her skin beneath her fingertips and the taste of her tongue, and—

“Lawrence, what’s the status on the cat?”

Danny jumps a foot away from Laura and looks around, before she remembers the radio at her hip.

She clears her throat before picking it up and replying.  “Just got it down.  There was a mishap with the ladder but we’re good now.”

There’s another buzz and Kirsh says, “All right, be back at the station ASAP just in case we need you.”

“Be there in ten.”

Danny reattaches the walkie talkie to her hip and purses her lips.  She and Laura stand in an awkward silence for a few moments, not really looking at each other, both trying to get the courage to speak up.

“So,” Danny finally says, “I should probably get going.”

“Yeah, I suppose,” Laura agrees.  She looks down at Carmilla and strokes her fur.

“But I had a quick question,” Danny says.  She waits until Laura looks up and meets her eyes.  “Would you like to get dinner sometime?”

Laura’s face lights up in a wide grin as she nods.  “I would love to.”

Ten minutes later, Danny is back at the station with a new contact programmed in her phone and plans on Friday night.  Nobody back at the station knows why she’s so happy, and not even Kirsch’s incessant prodding and teasing can bring her down.


End file.
